Standing Seam Metal Roofs: Always Look On The Bright Side of Life

Quick! What color is the standing seam metal roof on a Home Depot? Barnes & Noble? How about a Lowes Home Improvement store?

We’ll bet you knew all three of them-orange, green and blue. And not any orange, green and blue because each of those retail giants has a custom name for its colors. They know their colors play a key role along with signage to brand their companies and ultimately help customers identify and remember their stores in the great clutter of America’s malls and roadside retailers.

They are not alone. Scores of fast food chains, national and regional gas stations, hotel chains and the like have signature color standing seam metal roofs that serve as beacons to customers. The color in essence becomes part of their brand.

Why? Because color possesses an inherent ability to stimulate an aesthetic consciousness simply by the visual satisfaction that it creates. Used intelligently, color and colored light can add distinctiveness and appeal to any project.
The use of color as an architectural scheme in building goes back to the ancient Greeks who systematically controlled the use of color in every aspect of a structure. The Greeks used elaborate color schemes and complex ornamental designs in their treatment of the roof, using color values with a mutual affinity to achieve harmony from the top of the roof to the ridge lines.

Today, we are seeing some use of color in architecture, mostly in colorful facades accented with window and door treatments—some brilliantly lit at night to reveal the architecture and convey emotion. And outside the retail area but still within the bounds of commercial construction, some architects are exploring the potential of color in the roof environment. Without a doubt, no other roofing material can even touch the color choices a metal roof offers an architect in the design process. There are a vast number of standing seam metal roofing color choices available for architects and building owners to choose from.

Today’s metal roof choices are sufficient enough for creative architects to pick a complementary color that will psychologically convey what they want. For example, a sage green building looks peaceful and elegant with a hunter green roof and trim around doorways and windows. Most blue standing seam roofs are known to show respectability, trustworthiness and calmness and look great on a commercial building exterior.

Restaurants and bars use the color red because of it being known to psychologically make us hungrier, but you might want to rethink that for a gym or weight loss center. The use of brighter colors also occasionally surfaces in the design of athletic facilities where school colors are chosen to accentuate the roof and accent areas. Where the designer wants to use a custom hue, as little as 5,000 pounds of metal roofing material can be produced in a custom color. European designers seem to be a lot more comfortable than Americans in using bright color in exterior construction. Here, many building owners and architects have monochrome vision. So pervasive are timid off-whites, gray, blacks and beiges in commercial construction that it often takes some real coaxing to get clients to try something new. Some colorists even say it’s a mindset that keeps people living and working in dull surroundings. Overall, people tend to play it safe in the U.S. and go with the old stand-by colors. But for those who dare to be different, the color palate is there for them when they choose to design with panache. If “sex appeal” is, in fact, one of the primary reasons a builder or owner agrees to include a metal roof on their building, then architects and contractors have the opportunity to accentuate the color advantage of metal in the design process. If they are looking to expand their business, then driving home the versatility and value of color in a metal roof should top their list when they are pitching customers on their designs.